Saturday, November 19, 2011

Yesterday we drove back from Greytown to Paihia, a distance of about 860 km, including a diversion over the Woodville Saddle Road with the Manawatu Gorge Road closed (yet again).

With Radio Sport fading in and out and for something to do 'Mems' and I decided to count the number of election hordings each Party had erected along the way - Ok, bit like pulling wings off flies but what the hell. The result .....

National - 139

Labour - 62

Greens - 27

Winston First -21

ACT - 22

Conservatives - 11

Maori -22

Mana - 13

Democrats for Social Credit (thought they were long gone) - 4

United Future - Zip, zero, nothing

As I said, totally unscientific as a guide to the election result but it does indicate the relative organisational strengths of each Party and a Party with a strong organisational base is more likely to hold to account their parliamentary wing.

3 comments:

Your findings are massively skewed due to the fact that you would not have driven through many Labour electorates. Save for your short journey through South Auckland on the southern motorway. The map is all blue.They do not hold a rural seat anywhere and stop a fairway short of the harbour bridge.That is why they feel comfortable constantly banging on about the "holiday highway". They have no votes in the North. And the Hone seat will probably see a massive party vote swing away from Labour to the Maori party.

Yes, recognise that. But in terms of making their presence felt they fall well short of what is needed.

I guess when you a fighting to preserve what you have you deploy your resources accordingly.

Labour kicked Kelvin Davis in the teeth with (a) their comments re the 'Holiday Highway' and (b) their intention raise the qualification age for NZ Super given that the average life expectancy for a Maori male is just 70.4 years.